AP File PhotoGov. Jennifer Granholm is publicizing her plan to kickstart the budget process, which must produce a balanced 2010 spending plan by Oct. 1.

LANSING -- Gov. Jennifer Granholm's would balance the state budget in part through $685 million in tax increases and tax benefit reductions, steep cuts in social services spending and using federal aid, according to the plan she released Tuesday.

Granholm had declined comment on the specifics offered a month ago during closed-door budget negotiations. She is publicizing them now in an effort to kickstart a process that must produce a balanced 2010 spending plan by the Oct. 1 start of the new fiscal year.

Budget Director Robert Emerson said the plan calls for shared sacrifice, but cuts about as much as can be cut and still "protect the services that people need." Opening her plan to public inspection, he said, allows the process to "focus on how we resolve our differences rather than pointing fingers."

Bill Nowling, spokesman for House Republicans, said it's now time for Democrats who run the chamber to start writing revenue bills and putting them up for votes.

"If they don't start moving bills this week, the chances of avoiding another government shutdown become more remote," he said.

Granholm's proposal:

• Raises the tax on a pack of cigarettes from $2 to $2.25 and taxes other tobacco products at that new effective rate to raise a combined $135 million.

• Applies the state's sales tax to professional and college sports tickets, and concerts, generating $87 million.

• Places a penny tax on each bottle of water sold in Michigan to raise about $18 million.

• Generates $8 million by reducing the value of state credits for film production.

• Gathers $83 million by limiting next year's proposed increase in state earned income tax credits for low-wage workers.

Combined with the revenue, Granholm is proposing another $572 million in budget cuts beyond that proposed in February. The rest of the $1.8 billion deficit in the budget for general state services would be closed with federal economic stimulus funds. The package keeps the budget nearly in balance in 2011 based current revenue estimates.

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Business groups Tuesday blasted a budget process that ignores long-term structural reforms and waits until the last minute when pressure builds to raise taxes. Granholm does call for a business-backed change permitting the parole of felons who have served 85 percent of their minimum sentence. Current law calls for 100 percent completion. The change would lop another $78 million out of the Michigan Department of Corrections budget. Her proposal does not provide money to reverse the June layoff of 100 newly-trained Michigan State Police troopers, however.

Social service advocates complained last week the brunt of balancing the budget falls too heavily on the poor. Cutting tax credits for the working poor, Sharon Parks, president of the Michigan League for Human Services, said Tuesday impacts those who "are getting hit two and three and four times when you include cuts in prior years."

She added that Granholm's proposal to cut Medicaid provider rates by 8 percent -- up from 4 percent in the current year, but below the 12-percent, Senate-passed cut -- "will do nothing to increase access as docs bow out of the program."